Data-as-a-Product in the SAP Datasphere: The role of data providers, their data products and the data marketplace
- SAP Datasphere
- Reading time: nine minutes
Francis Heep
How can companies transform their data into products that can be used and reused by others?
With the Data-as-a-Product approach, SAP Datasphere offers an innovative concept for organizing and using data products.
Data can be packaged into structured, reusable data products. These data products can be provided by data providers, published via a data marketplace and consumed by users as required.
This article deals with the functionality and implementation of the Data-as-a-Product concept within the SAP Datasphere.
Table of contents
1. data provider
The data provider plays a central role here as the provider of the data products. Only DSP users who act as data providers are authorized to provide and publish data products.
In addition to a valid Datasphere license, a user also needs their own data provider profile to open up this role and the associated options.
The data provider can then create their data products, manage their access and provide continuous updates through the targeted publication of releases. These steps are illustrated in the following diagram.
In the further course of the article, these process steps aon the basis the Data Products "Sales Orders Insights" described.
DThis data product contains data for the analysis of sales orders with detailed insights into the order history. This can support companies in forecasting sales and optimizing supply chain processes. processes.
Data provider profile
In the Kontext der SAP Datasphere a data provider is a person or a company thatwhich data products defined and through the Data Marketplace vpublished(see Fig. 2).
Through a targeted control of so-called contexts and licenses the data provider define, for whom the published Data Products are visible and who may consume them may. This enables the data provider to controlled and secure distribution of its data products guarantee.
A data provider accesses the data products in contrast to a Data Consumer not via the Data Marketplace viabut administered, published and manages them via the Data Sharing Cockpit.
As can be seen in figure threein addition to maintaining the master data of the respective data provider in the data provider profile, the marketplace visibility and the transmission types of data transmission are also restricted.
The marketplace visibility determines whether the data provider is generally allowed to publish on public, private or internal data marketplaces. marketplaces. Further details on this can be found in the Marketplace section.
When sending data via Open SQL, the user must provide an Open SQL schema. After activation, the provided schema is available in the Data Builder as a data source and can be used there.
External delivery refers to the provision of files, for example in .csv format, for use outside the SAP Datasphere. In the example shown, however, the data provider "s-peers DP" is limited to data transfer: IntegratedDelivery.
When selecting Data Transfer: Integrated delivery, a data consumer can import the artefacts into the space they have selected, provided they have the necessary license for this data product.
They then have read access to the view and can use it as a source for an analytical model, for example.
In contrast to conventional methods of data exchange, such as via flat files, APIs and dashboard exports, this approach enables data to be integrated into DSP models without the need for a different interface.
In addition to this information, the profile of the data provider also provides an overview of the data products published to date(see Fig. 4).
2. data product
In the SAP Datasphere, data products are are bundled, reusable data units that can be defined and published by a data provider and consumed by other DSP users.
A data provider can define its data products via the "My Data Product" area in the Data Sharing Cockpit.
In addition to descriptive metadata, DSP spaces, data product artifacts and filters to be applied to these artifacts can also be defined, depending on the configuration.
Currently, only views can be used as artifacts for a data product. For data transmission with integrated delivery, a distinction must also be made between the delivery modes. In the example(see Fig. 5), live access was selected: Instead of replication, the data is shared directly within the same tenant. Changes are immediately visible as the views appear directly in the target space. This mode ensures that the data always remains up-to-date. A data product does not have its own visibility area. So-called "contexts" are used to define the visibility for potential data consumers. As a visibility must be defined for each data product, the assignment of a context is mandatory when creating a data product. These contexts are workspaces defined by the data provider that can be flexibly linked to one or more data products. They enable customizable access control to data products in the non-public Marketplace, in which users and user groups can be added, adjusted or removed as required.
Once published, data providers and data products can be searched and found by users in the Datasphere Data Catalog as long as they are within the visibility area released for them.
Unfortunately, a link to metadata (objects) such as KPIs or terms, as is possible with assets, cannot yet be implemented in the Data Catalog. SAP plans to introduce this functionality in the release for the fourth quarter of 2025.
A comprehensive explanation of assets, KPIs, terms and the maintenance of metadata in the Data Catalog as well as their linking options is provided in the following article: From order to added value
In the remainder of this article, however, the focus will be on the Data Marketplace, where potential data consumers can search for and view data products and data providers.
3. publication in the Data Marketplace
The visibility defines for which DSP users a Data product is visible. With this visibility a distinction is made when publishing of a data product between Public Marketplace, Private Marketplace and Internal Marketplace.
These three types of marketplaces are not to be understood as separate platforms, but refer to the visibility of data providers and visibility of the Data Providers and Data Products for potential data consumers. As soon as the Data Provider makes its Data product completely defined, he can this publish it via the "List" button.
Subsequently the published Data product can be found by the DSP users for whom the respective Data Marketplace is visible.
The type of Data Marketplace and who has access to the Data Products is determined via the contexts controlled.
Public Data Marketplace
Data products listed via the Public Data Marketplace option are visible to all DSP instances on the SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP), which serves as a central cloud environment for the development, integration and management of applications. The Context Public Marketplace is assigned to every user of the Data Marketplace by default and cannot be left. Every user of a DSP has the option of finding the data products and importing them depending on the license.
Private Data Marketplace
With the Private Data Marketplace option, the visibility of Data Products after publication is restricted to invited users. The invitation is made via Activation Keys, with which a user can activate their access to the Data Marketplace.
Internal Data Marketplace
With the "Internal Data Marketplace" option, the visibility of published data products is restricted to members of specific tenants that can be defined by the data provider in the context. A good example of this is the exchange of data between departments, specialist areas or subsidiaries that each use different DSP tenants.
Contexts enable data providers to control private and internal marketplaces in a targeted manner and to define the visibility of data products for specific users or user groups. If a user is assigned to a context that contains a specific data product, this data product is visible to them together with the metadata in the data marketplace. To actually be able to consume the data product, the user also needs the appropriate license for the data product.
The data provider can generate and send activation keys to invite users to a specific context. In the "Data Marketplace - My Context" area, the data consumer can activate these keys and manage their membership of various contexts. By joining a context, the user gains access to the data products published there.
A large number of activation keys can be created for a context and each recipient can activate several activation keys for different contexts.
In the example shown below(see Fig. 6), the "Financial reporting" context was created as a Private Data Marketplace with a validity until 31.12.2024. Two activation keys for data providers and two for members were generated and sent for this context, whereby only one member activation key has been activated so far. A Member Activation Key gives the recipient access to the Marketplace as a member, making the Marketplace visible to them. A Data Provider Activation Key, on the other hand, not only grants the invitee access to the Marketplace, but also the authorization to act as a Data Provider in the Context and to publish their own Data Products in the Context. Data Provider Activation Keys are not activated via "Data Marketplace - My Context", but in the "Data Sharing Cockpit - Context Management".
Both the data provider who created the context and invited users, as well as the user themselves, can independently determine that this user leaves the context again. These processes are documented in "Context Management" and - as shown in the screenshot - can be transparently traced by the data provider.
In the role of the data consumer arrives the DSPuser via the navigation on the left-hand side(see Fig. 7) to the Data Marketplace and can use the free text search and filters such as Data Category, Delivery Pattern(release cycle) or Regional Coverage apply.
In contrast to the Data Consumer, who accesses the Data Marketplace via the Data Marketplace menu - as shown in the screenshot above - the Data Provider has central access to the management of their Data Products in the Data Sharing Cockpit.
In this area, the data provider can view their published data products, monitor the status and make further adjustments.
They can also track how many users have viewed or installed a particular data product.
The data provider can use the lineage and impact analysis to track the subsequent Spaces in which the data product has been replicated, provided that the "Integrated Delivery" data transfer has been selected.
There is currently no option to automatically notify the data provider in the DSP interface about relevant events in connection with their data product.
The following screenshot(see Fig. 8) shows the Data Marketplace from the role of the data provider: the landing page of the Data Sharing Cockpit.
4. control access
While a context the visibility of ther data products, a user also needs the necessary the necessary license to it to be able to consume it.
Similar to Contexts the allocation, use and deletion of licenses and their activation keys for the data provider are documented in the Data Sharing Cockpit, as shown in Figure 9. A license can comprise several data products. Likewise one Data product can be assigned to different licenses.
5. updates to the product release
Publication management in the Data Marketplace enables controlled data updates via the Data Sharing Cockpit through the creation of new releases for a data product.
The releases are displayed in a table in which users can use interactive filters to view specific information such as download history and release status., listed in a table.
6. conclusion
In summary, the SAP Datasphere offers an interesting approach to providing and using data as structured data products within the platform with the concepts of data providers, data products and the data marketplace. The Dataas-a-Product model promotes decentralized responsibility and management of data and enables uncomplicated integration without the need for in-depth knowledge of the underlying data model in order to consume the data.
The model is particularly relevant for companies that focus their data strategy on self-service approaches and relieve the burden on central IT want to.
Users can work on or consume specific data products without having to go through complex access controls or lengthy approval processes. Depending on the data transfer selected, there is no need for additional interfaces within the same system.
Comparing Data Products with conventional views and access authorizations, there is a strong similarity in the basic functionality: both approaches regulate access to data and its use. However, the Data Marketplace offers an extension, as it enables pull-based data provision. Instead of a data provider having to actively release data to specific users, they can search for relevant data products themselvesrequest them and consume them. While traditional approaches often rely on predefined authorizations and manual approval processes, the Marketplace supports a more decentralized and flexible management of data access.
In its current implementation, the concept does not yet appear to be fully developed, especially when you consider the added value compared to the previous share function within DSP modeling. Improvements could be achieved through enhancements, such as the ability to link metadata objects directly to data products - similar to what is already the case with assets. The integration of other DSP artifacts, such as analytical models, could also significantly increase the practical benefits of data products. It remains exciting to see how these approaches will be implemented and further developed in future development phases.
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